Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge / 2007 / iii / Paper 71 / 1 / a / Solution

Along a smooth exact solution, the chain rule gives $g(y)=f^{\prime }(y)f(y)=y^{\prime \prime }$. Expand the unscaled defect of the multiderivative multistep method about the central time $t_n$. The antisymmetric difference of the solution and second derivative, and the symmetric sum of first derivatives, giveAll derivatives are evaluated at $t_n$. Reflection symmetry removes every even power. The fifth-order conditions require the coefficients of $h,h^3,h^5$ to vanish. The last two equations give $\beta =1/15$ and $\alpha =7/15$, and the first then gives $\gamma =16/15$. ThusThese determine the symmetric two-step two-derivative formula. Substitution into the next coefficient givesThe requested fifth-order conditions actually produce formal order six. In the usual maximal-order terminology there is no member of this symmetric family with exact order five: cancelling the fifth-power defect also cancels the automatically zero sixth-power defect. Interpreting the printed request as order at least five gives precisely the boxed parameters.

At zero step size the recurrence polynomial is $w^2-1$, with simple roots $1$ and $-1$, so it satisfies the root condition for a multistep method and is zero-stable. With sufficiently smooth locally Lipschitz derivative maps, the nearby implicit solution branch and starting values of matching accuracy, the convergence of a zero-stable multiderivative method gives global order six. Formal order by itself does not imply decay of its additional numerical mode.